The Split Milk

The Split Milk


babymilk-1.jpg Baby picture by zubia_2007



This is a story about a famous research scientist
who had made several very important
medical breakthroughs.
He was being interviewed by a newspaper reporter
who asked him why he thought he was
able to be so much more creative than
the average person.
What set him so far apart from others?


He responded that, in his opinion,
it all came from an experience with his mother
that occurred when he was about two years old.
He had been trying to remove a bottle of milk
from the refrigerator when he lost his grip
on the slippery bottle and it fell,
spilling its contents all over the kitchen floor
a veritable sea of milk!


When his mother came into the kitchen,
instead of yelling at him,
giving him a lecture, or punishing him,
she said, "Robert, what a great and
wonderful mess you have made!
I have rarely seen such a huge puddle of milk.
Well, the damage has already been done.
Would you like to get down and play in the milk
for a few minutes before we clean it up?"


Indeed, he did. After a few minutes,
his mother said, "You know, Robert,
whenever you make a mess like this,
eventually you have to clean it up and
restore everything to its proper order.
So, how would you like to do that?
We could use a sponge, a towel, or a mop.
Which do you prefer?"
He chose the sponge and together
they cleaned up the spilled milk.


His mother then said, "You know,
what we have here is a failed experiment
in how to effectively carry a big milk bottle
with two tiny hands.
Let's go out in the back yard and fill the bottle
with water and see if you can discover a way
to carry it without dropping it."
The little boy learned that if he grasped the bottle
at the top near the lip with both hands,
he could carry it without dropping it.
What a wonderful lesson!

This renowned scientist then remarked that
it was at that moment that he knew
he didn't need to be afraid to make mistakes.
Instead, he learned that mistakes were
just opportunities for learning something new,
which is, after all,
what scientific experiments are all about.
Even if the experiment "doesn't work,"
we usually learn something valuable from it.

great readable post

Nice story

lovely post